Cover for garment hangers



July 7, 1953 M. B. GWINN l-TFAL COVER FOR GARMENT HANGERS 2 Sheets-Sheet 1 Filed May 11. 1950 INVENTORS DONALD E. HOP KIN MYRON- B. GWINN WHITEHEAQ a VOGL PER @MVW Gttornegs y 7, 1953 M. B. GWINN ET AL COVER FOR GARMENT HANGERS 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 Filed May 11, 1950 INVENTORS DONALD E. HOPK IN MYRON B; GWINN WHITEHEAD a VOGL attorney;

Patented July 7, 1953 COVER FOR GARMENT HANGERS Myron B. Gwinn and Donald E. Hopkin Denver, Colo.

Application May 11, 1950, Serial No. 161,324

This invention relates to protective covers for garment hangers and the like, and more particularly to a protective cover for the conventional light-weight wire-formed garment hangers commonly used in cleaning and dry goods establishments, and has as an object to provide a cover adapted to enclose the body of a garment hanger and thereby prevent contact of said hanger with articles draped thereover.

A further object of the invention is to provide a cover which shall snugly contain the hanger and which shall cover all of the members thereof without gripping any single member and which, when containing the hanger, shall bulge or round outwardly over and on each side of the hanger arms.

Another object of this invention is to provide a cover which will snugly contain a garment hanger without gripping any particular member of thehanger, thereby permitting fiexure of the hanger members within the cover, such fiexure commonly occurring by loading the hanger with a garment.

Yet another object of this invention is to provide a garment hanger cover adapted to be manufactured out of paper sheet material obtainable in the form of rolls of ribbon which has the opposite sides of opposite margins stripped with a latex-type adhesive, such roll material being a commercial low-cost product, whereby said garment hanger cover may be produced at an extremely small unit cost.

Another object of this invention is to provide a garment hanger cover adapted to be manufactured out of paper sheet material in the form of rolls of ribbon having the opposite sides of the opposite margins stripped with a latex-type adhesive, such manufacture consisting of cutting simple blanks from said ribbon material.

Another object of this invention is to provide a garment hanger cover which may be conveniently supplied in the form of paper blanks cut from ribbon material having the opposite sides of its opposite margins stripped with a latex-type adhesive, said blanks being adapted to be compactly stacked and packaged, and further adapted to be folded about a garment hanger by quick, simple manual movements.

Another object of this invention is to provide a garment hanger cover formed as a paper blank adapted to be folded over a garment hanger hav-' ing, when folded, a convenient opening to its interior portion wherein identification or data bearing cards or other similar light-weight objects may be placed.

l 3 Claims. (Cl. 22398) pressing the parts together.

With these and other objects in view, all of which shall hereinafter more fully appear, our invention comprises certain new and novel constructions, arrangements and combinations of elements as hereinafter described and as defined in the appended claims, and illustrated, in preferred embodiment, in the accompanying drawing in which:

Figure 1 is an illustration, somewhat diagrammatic in nature, of a roll of paper ribbon material prepared with marginal strips of adhesive adapted for use in the present invention.

Figure 2 illustrates, on a considerably enlarged scale, a blank cut from the strip material illustrated at Fig. 1, with a conventional garment hanger placed thereon as in position for folding.

Figure 3 illustrates the blank as partially folded over the garment hanger with portions of the blank indicating various intermediate positions in the folding process.

Figure 4 illustrates the folded cover enclosing a garment hanger with a card inserted in the inner portion to further illustrate the use and nature of construction of the cover.

Figure 5 is a section, on a further enlarged scale, as taken on the indicated line '5-5 at Fig. 4.

Figure 6 illustrates a blank positioned for folding over a hanger with the garment hanger placed over the blank and with the fingers of the operator positioned for gripping the blank and hanger as in an initial step of the folding operation.

Figure 'I is similar to Fig. 6 illustrating the blank partially folded over the hanger by manipulation of the thumb.

Figure 8 is similar to Figs. -6 and 7 illustrating the further folding of the blank by the fingers to enclose the garment hanger therein.

With the present extensive development of latex-type adhesive, it is now possible to apply adhesive coatings to material such as paper which will not adhere to any surface other than a similar latex-coated surface but will be tightly and instantly joined to such similar surface by simply In the preparation of paper blanks for subsequent folding or other manipulation, it is possible to stack or pile a large number of paper blanks having adhesive-prepared surfaces together without any undesirable sticking, provided that the prepared surfaces are arranged so as not to contact each other while stacked. With such an arrangement certain advantageous constructions of paper articles are possible which permit cheap manufacture and compact storage and packaging of the blanks prior to folding or other similar final steps in hesive strip I I preparation for their use, it being anticipated that such final steps involve the joining of the adhesive-prepared surfaces.

A conventional way of providing commercially, in quantity, a prepared adhesive-coated paper adapted for various uses, is with a ribbon having adhesive-coated strips at the opposite sides of the opposite margins. In a paper ribbon 9 adaptedfor the present invention the adhesivecoated strips II and Ila at the opposite sides I and la of the opposite margins I2 and I20. cannot contact any adhesive-prepared surface to cause sticking, for such ribbon is generally supplied as rolls R, and, when rolled, the adhesive strips always contact a clean paper surface of the adjacent paper. In preparation of such a roll for the present invention it is also desirable to provide a folding crease I3 therein suitably marked in spaced parallelism with the edge of the ribbon. Such prepared ribbon, in the form of rolls R, is a low-cost, conventional item, and the garment hanger cover, embodying the present invention is designed to be made of the abovedescribed ribbon material with a minimum of further steps in the preparation of a cover blank In the present invention the blank III is cut from a suitable length of paper ribbon material ID. This material has comparatively narrow oppositely faced adhesive strips II and I la. adjacent the respective margins I2 and I2a with the folding crease I3 along the inner edge of the ad- The width of the ribbon material between the margins I2 and IZa. is somewhat greater than the height of the body of a conventional hanger H, enoughso that the effective width after folding at the crease I3 is approximately the same as the height of the body of the hanger H. The length of the blank I4 is approximately equal to the span of the outstanding arms [5 of the hanger although this length may be varied somewhat if desired.

The opposite ends of the blank are symmetrically formed with the lower edge, which carries the adhesive-coated strip II, having its corners suitably clipped as at I6 and the upper corners of the blank being clipped as at IT, directed inwardly from a point a short distance above the crease I3 to the margin I20, the slope I'I being so disposed as to lie in substantial parallelism with the crease I3 and adjacent thereto upon being folded over the arms I5 of the garment hanger as hereinafter described. At the top center of the blank there is provided a notch I8 which is cut to assist the proper positioning of the hanger I-I upon the blank, the base of the hooked portion I9 of the hanger being suitably positioned at said notch.

It is .to be seen that this blank I4 may be out from ribbon material to the proper length and shape by any suitable knife means, which, by well-known means, may be arranged to a continuous cutting and preparation of the blanks to stack a plurality of the blanks I4 to provide a compact package which may be shipped or stored and used later as needed. The adhesive coated edges lie against adjacent clean surfaces when stacked in a symmetrical manner and no blank will tend to stick to the adjacent blanks.

In the use f such blanks to form the cover a hanger H is suitably positioned on the face IIla with the lower bar 20 of the hanger adjacent the crease I3 and with the base of the hook I9 at the notch I8 as clearly illustrated at Figs. 2 and 6.

As a first step in covering the hanger, the marginal portion below the crease I3 is folded upwardly over the bar 26 to expose the adhesive strip II as illustrated at Figs. 3, '4, 7 and 8. The second step is to fold the portions of the blank, which extend outwardly and above the arms I5 of the hanger, over said arms to position the sloping edges II in spaced parallelism and adjacent the crease I 3 as clearly illustrated at Figs. 3 and 8. With such folding operation a portion of the adhesive strip I la contacts a portion of the adhesive strip II adjacent the base of the cover to thereby connect the paper surfaces at area 2I which is indicated in broken lines at Figs. 3 and 8. This step completes the enclosure of the hanger within the cover. So enclosed, the hanger is snugly encased by the cover; yet no individual vmember thereof is actually gripped. The material forming the blank has a certain amount of resiliency and it is not stretched taut in the applying operation. This results in a slight bulging of the material n each side of the arms, thus forming a gently rounded surface over the arms instead of a sharp edge such as would be formed were the material gripped snugly around each arm. This result is most advantageous in preventing the creasing of filmy garments hung on the'coveredhanger. The individual members of the hangerare free to flex within the cover to a certain degree whenever the hanger is loaded as by placing a garment thereon.

Itis to be noted that the portion of the adhesive-coated strip I la adjacent the hook I9 appears to fold ,over itself. However, the 'conventional hanger at this base of the hook I9 is formed with short horizontal extensions 22 of the arms I5 between the base of the hook and the sloping portion of the arms. It follows that the adhesive strip I la at said overlapping points adjacent the base of the hook I9 is effectively held apart by such hanger construction and the elements of the blank are so positioned and proportioned that no sticking of the latex surface IIb upon itself will occur.

In the folded position of the blank enclosing the hanger, the interior portion defined by the folds of the blank over the arms I5 to join the edge IIwith the upfolded strip at the base may be used as .pockets which may be used to contain small lightweight articles such as identification card 23, the access to the pockets being at the sloping edges In of the folded cover. This construction is especially desirable in drygoods articles wher it is necessary to have identification cards, statements, etc. with the hanger.

The application of a number of covers to hangers maybe accomplished by suitable mechanical devices or may be done manually, in either case the operations performed being of a similar nature. Figs. 6, '7 and 8 illustrate one method of the manual application of a cover to a hanger, these step being exceedingly simple in nature. A blank I4 may be positioned with the face Illa upwardly. As 'a first step the hanger H will be placed in position and held thereto by placing the index fingers upon the arms I5. The

' margin I2 is then contacted bythe thumbs and folded upward and over the bar 20 of the hanger and the thumb pressure then holds the hanger in position by contacting the lower bar through the folded margin. As this movement is com pleted the sloping edges I! are contacted by the middle finger and lifted and folded over the arms [5. As the middle finger lifts the edges of the blank, the index finger likewise supplements th movement of middle finger, and as the fold.

over the arms [5 is completed, the index finger is extended centrally toward the area 2| whereby the pressure at the overlapping portions of strips II and Ila are pressed together and adhere to each other, and the operation is completed. With such simple movements it is apparent that a large number of hangers may be covered manually in a very short time.

While we have herein described a preferred construction of our invention, alternatives and,

zontal bar and shoulder bars upwardly converg- V 1 ing therefrom, said blank having parallel to and bottom edges, a marginal coating of adhesiv along each of said edges but on respectively opposite faces of the blank, the adhesive having the characteristic of adhering to a like coated surface but of non-adherence to an uncoated surface, a body portion of said blank having an area at least as large as the area of said hanger within the outer lines of said bars, one of said coated margins being adapted to fold upwardly over said horizontal bar and thereby outwardly expose said coated margin, the upper corner portions of said blank being adapted to fold downwardly over said shoulder bars and thereby to bring portions of said oppositely coated margin into engaging contact with said outwardly Y 6 exposed coated margin, the body of said blank, Within said horizontal bar and said shoulder bars, being uncoated whereby to avoid adherence of the folded portions of said blank with the body portion thereof. 7

2. A cover for a conventional wire garment hanger having a horizontal .bar and shoulder bars upwardly converging from the horizontal bar, said cover being formed of paper-like material and having a body portion overlying one side of the hanger, flaps integral with said body portion but projecting respectively beyond and being respectively folded over said horizontal bar and said shoulder bars, the flap folded over the horizontal bar being coated, on its face which is outwardly exposed when folded, with an adhesive having the characteristic of adherence to a like coated surface but non-adherence to an uncoated surface, the flaps folded over the shoulder bars overlapping said first folded flap and being coated with like adhesive at such overlapping areas, the body portion being uncoated in the area within said bars whereby to avoid adherence between the flaps and the body portion.

3. In a cover as defined in claim 2, the edges of said shoulder-bar flaps nearest the center of the cover being spaced apart whereby to provide an opening for insertion of an article therethrough and into the space between the flaps and the body portion. I

MYRON B. GWINN. DONALD E. I-IOPKIN;

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS Number Name Date 2,155,737 Ruen Apr. 25, 1939 2,491,896 Kestner et al Dec. 20, 1949 2,566,232 Madsen Aug. 28, 1951 

